Feels exiled. Why doesn't Mariel write? Cooks sometimes to relieve boredom. Rides bicycle when weather permits. Planned and orchestrated a wedding breakfast for her [Cather's] cousin and Hugh Miner. Looked after the children the previous week while parents went to Hastings. Enjoys playing cards and going visiting with Douglass and Roscoe, when he comes to town. Has been reading Arabian Nights and Alice in Wonderland to James. Willa [Stout #22]
Not fair to accuse her of keeping her address a secret. Had not expected to be daytime telegraph editor when she accepted the Leader job, but when it became available applied and got it, despite youth and sex. Work is like running a race, but hours are short. Hard to write distinctive headlines for a dozen suicides at a time. Has received A Portrait of a Lady [ James ]. Mr. Farrar has come to call, so must break off. Willa Cather [Stout #46]
Dorothy Canfield is the "Real Thing." [allusion to story by Henry James.] [Stout #54]
As a result of Dorothy's having written to her [Cather's] mother, has had the first letter from her that she could bear to read in two years. They may yet make peace. Isabelle and Edith away on a fishing trip to West Virginia. Sarah Harris has written denouncing the "animalism" of April Twilights—must be crazy. Is tired from parties and work. Is Mrs. Canfield painting? Has she read "The Better Sort" [volume of short stories by Henry James, pub. 1903]? Very complex and obscure. Willie [Stout #85]
Agrees the story is rather chilly and impersonal, but it doesn't warrant amplification. Looks forward to visit so they can talk. Will try again on The Golden Bowl [James, 1904]. Didn't manage to penetrate it last year. Wonders what new Kipling story is about. Willa Sibert Cather [Stout #109]
Has revised the story but done nothing with the novel. Appreciates his calling her book to [Henry?] James's attention; very pleased with James's letter. Would be disappointed if he and a couple of others did not think the way he says. Feels nervous at the thought of his considering her writing further. Willa Sibert Cather [Stout #110]
Has just returned from a week in the Apennines. Spent two days in Pompeii and is enjoying the Pompeiian collection at the Naples Museum, also the beautiful Bay of Naples. The classical world seems close at hand. Has regained enough Latin to read Tacitus and Suetonius. Remembers seeing a picture of the bust of Caesar in a textbook when Mr. Goudy was her teacher, and now has seen it at the museum. Farmers working their fields just as in Virgil's Georgics. Goes on to Rome next week. Willa [Stout #137]
What a beautiful place! Camellias and roses in bloom all around. Room overlooks the Gulf of Salerno, as blue as the water in a [Pierre] Puvis de Chavannes painting. Yesterday a festival celebrating the arrival of the skull of St. Andrew in Amalfi seven hundred years ago, but enjoyment interrupted by the arrival of some people she used to know in Nebraska. [Alice] Meynell's essays about Italy in the book Jewett gave her are very fine, especially the essay "The Lesson of Landscape," but A. E. Housman writes with equal truthfulness, and she includes a transcription of his "The Olive," a poem he gave her that she has never seen in print. The "White Heron" and the Dunnet ladies [references to copies of books by Jewett] are always with her. Willa Cather [Stout #138]
Had hoped to be there for commencement, but is leaving for London on business. Has kept up with Red Cloud schools through brothers and sisters. Remembers with love Mr. and Mrs. A. K. Goudy and Mr. and Mrs. O. C. Case. Mrs. Case, then Miss King, was principal when she first entered the school. Remembers her first teacher and some of her fellow pupils. Always tried to please Miss King, who helped and advised her all through high school—even tried to teach her algebra, an impossibility. Hard to believe it has been nineteen years since she graduated. Best wishes to the new graduates. They should try to live up to their teachers' goals for them. Willa Cather [Stout #159]
Is pleased to have the Adams book [prob. Henry Adams, Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres, 1904; reissued by Houghton Mifflin in 1913]. Tell Nancy Moore her serial will get a quick reading by Mackenzie [at McClure's]. Willa Cather [Stout #273]
